Old facts, new posers

OUR SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT

Assembly Speaker Uday Narayan Chaudhary interacts with 55 students invited to the Bihar Legislative Assembly from St Joseph’s Convent School to observe the proceedings on Monday. Picture by Deepak Kumar

Patna, Feb. 17: Governor D.Y. Patil has repeated many government claims that his predecessor Devanand Konwar had made addressing the joint session of the Bihar legislature in 2013.

Patil’s address to the joint session of the legislature on February 14 lasted barely five minutes as he skipped through the 27-page speech.

Participating in the vote of thanks for the governor’s speech, Leader of Opposition Nand Kishore Yadav, who tore into the Nitish government’s claims inside the House on Monday, highlighted the contradictions in Konwar’s and Patil’s speech.

“When one goes through the two speeches, it seems that the government has stagnated in many areas and has fallen in some,” said Yadav.

The state government prepares the governor’s speech, highlighting its achievements in the past year. The cabinet has to approve the speech before it is delivered.

“Since Nand Kishore is in the opposition, he will have something to say. But the governor’s speech is on policy matters. There will be repetitions because of ongoing schemes,” said parliamentary affairs minister Bijendra Prasad Yadav, stressing that chief minister Nitish Kumar will give a detailed reply to Nand Kishore inside the Assembly on Tuesday.